Octave effect placement...

F

Fatjac

Inspired
Hi all,

I am trying to put together a patch with some of my most used effects as my "go to".

On it one of the effects that I want is an Octaver which can go up or down selected by X/Y.

Just wondering where is best to place it in the chain? Pre/ Post? Before/ after any particular effects?

Any thoughts please.

Gary
 
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Only my advice, but i ALWAYS place octave/pitch first. The only "rule" would be never after distorsion.
 
Lax said:
Only my advice, but i ALWAYS place octave/pitch first. The only "rule" would be never after distorsion.
Click to expand...

Not my rule. :)

Except for Octavia, but that's a Drive block mode.

PITCH after AMP sounds better to me. And a distorted AMP will not mess up the pitch detection as long as SOURCE is set to GLOBAL in the PITCH block.

In any case: always before the CAB block. Here's why.
 
I am a big fan of Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow days when he used the octave on many songs. The only way I got close to the studio sound was to put the octave in the chain rather than upfront.
 
Pitch location depends on what it's doing for me. Drop tuning or shifting keys, I place it first in the chain as if the sound was coming from the guitar itself.

For harmonies, I always put those after the amp so I'm shifting an already driven signal into two pitches (like a second player next to me).
 
IMO, depends on what your looking for. If tying to emulate the growly sound of a pedal octaves, put it front of the amp. If you want a "clearer" result, put it after the the amp block. Different favors.
 
Thanks again for the further replies.

So I tried it out. Octave first with X/ Y for up/ down. Phase, wah, 2 distortion blocks all in front of the amp.

Univibe, delay & reverb in the loop.

Sounds really good except for the octave up on the Y setting. That sounds thin & "fake".

The 2 songs that I am trying to use the octave shift for are Whiskey In the Jar (Metallica version) for the down setting & Are You Gonna Go My Way for the up setting.

So pretty much a success except for the octave up.

The univibe alone made me play for a couple of hours through my JVM!
 
I like running the ring modulator in parallel with a drive pedal (before the amp, obviously) for octave down effects. Not sure if this helps you for the octave up, I don't remember if you can go up with the ring mod "trick."
 
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